This is another in the Myth Buster series (more here) that looks at questions that regularly get asked of search engines or (more likely nowadays) ChatGPT and the like.

What is Jimmy Carr’s net worth?

There are tons of websites (like this one).

As the author of the page is “Editorial Team”, this always makes me suspicious that that means AI generated.

I digress.

This is just one example of the slew of low grade, “celebrity” websites that purport to know someone’s Net Worth (Jimmy isn’t the only person that they, and others, have written about).

In this article they are claiming $35m and as this is a UK website, I would say the use of Dollars def points to automated, harvested content.

Here’s the thing…these Celeb sites have been quoting that number for over a decade. About a man that is CONSTANTLY on tour and has tons of hit TV shows (apart from all of his other creative outlets) and yet has supposedly not earned any more money…

Which is what happens when you regurgitate information from sources that are slop themselves.

On the one hand – it’s nonsense. On the other – it’s none of our business (IMHO).

The Nordic countries have made tax returns public records (see Reuters piece here) and that’s a good idea, if everyone agrees to it and it’s accurate, official data. But notice, in the first paragraph, that, in Finland, its known as “national envy day”. I agree with that – the reason I personally dislike articles about Net Worth because they just generates envy.

I’ve never looked into “worth”, as a metric (or written about it), because I don’t think it’s relevant as this type of article (above) just fuels nasty comments – even though the information is made up (just the fact that it’s been the same number for 10 years confirms that).

Bottom line – he works hard and, ever since the K2 tax scheme hiccup (here), has paid the top rate of UK tax (whatever that is this week).

He also directly employs a lot of people (in the UK) and indirectly contributes to jobs markets via touring activity, TV shows etc.

Look at the Crowd Work Heckle Amnesty series as an example – how many are involved in filming, editing, cataloguing, creating thumbnails and then posting to YouTube and all of Jimmy’s social channels? And then making audio versions for the podcast version. Did you think he did it all by himself? Sure, some of it could be automated – but the man’s not filming his own shows.

With ANY comedian (or Film star, singer, artist etc.) my stance has always been – if I don’t like them, then I don’t give them my money, don’t give them a second thought and go about my day, content with my lot.

Years ago, I worked somewhere where someone accidentally circulated the salary data for several hundred employees…I honestly deleted it without looking. I was possibly the only person that didn’t peep but I decided that I was better off NOT knowing, for all kinds of reasons.

Why do I think it’s not accurate?

I don’t think any of these types of net worth “stabs in the dark” are accurate because there are so many unknown variables.

I would imagine most people know someone that has claimed to be skint all their lives and then died and left a fortune (or vice versa – the old “fur coat, no knickers” syndrome).

Some comedians have all of their income through a Limited Company (or the US equivalent) and so their public accounts could be looked at each year.

But if they don’t use a company (or have a kind of hybrid model of SOME of their activity, but not all, going through one) then you have no idea.

I’ve not bothered with the Sunday Times Rich List for years, for example, for the same reason

That paper may have people that are a bit more savvy about looking at this stuff, but they still don’t know:

• How much is someone getting paid for hosting a TV show? Corporate events? Book sales? All they can do is ESTIMATE by using industry standard numbers and/or insider gossip.
• How many tickets, per annum, are they selling and at what price?
• What are the persons overheads for office / tour / social media staff?
• What is their income from social media?
• Do they sell merchandise and, if so, what is their income?
• Did they send an Estate agent around to get a current valuation on the person’s house (or houses)?

Yada yada

On top of all of those “don’t knows” and “very hard to find out” things no one also knows how big someone’s personal outgoings may be.

In the sports world, for example, how many times has a star been declared bankrupt because of alcoholism / gambling debts / generally not being financially savvy etc. All while the press was writing about their Lambo’s (sometimes leased) or multi-million-pound houses (could be mortgaged to the hilt) and yet writing about how much they were (allegedly) worth.

All of which is a VERY long way of saying – only Jimmy, his missus and his accountants know how much he is worth. And I’m ok with that.

Just ignore the slop websites!

(would be my advice)